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larryhammerI went into Not a Lot of Reasons to Sing, But Enough by Kyle Tran Myhre (who also raps as Guante) expecting a collection of poems, like his first book, A Love Song, a Death Rattle, a Battle Cry. Instead, it’s a work of anthropological science fiction set on a prison world, called Moon, where all transportees were memory-wiped, with the last arriving two generations ago and there’s no communication with the home World. The bulk of the book is documents (poems, speeches, folktales, transcripts of conversations) relating to a famous itinerant robot poet, Gyre—or rather, that are supposed to relate to them, but what the folklorists collected are mostly about their apprentice, a human named Nazy.
Although this is clearly a pandemic project,* the strongest threads relate to what artists, especially those who use words as their medium, can do with their art to work against authoritarianism and other oppressions. This is on-brand for Myhre/Guante, whose songs are very often in activist modes.
There’s not much plot but there is definitely story, told indirectly, and even something of a(n open) resolution. Recommended, as it’s otherwise not getting much attention in SFF circles, that I can see, and it's part of that conversation.**
* Best evidence: the prose-poem “Ten Responses to the Proposal to Overcome the Current Plague by Challenging It to a Duel.”
** The short list of works he found helpful, in the back, include Parable of the Sower and How Long ‘til Black Future Month?.
---L.
Subject quote from “The Light We Make,” from Not a Lot of Reasons to Sing, But Enough, Kyle Tran Myhre.
Although this is clearly a pandemic project,* the strongest threads relate to what artists, especially those who use words as their medium, can do with their art to work against authoritarianism and other oppressions. This is on-brand for Myhre/Guante, whose songs are very often in activist modes.
There’s not much plot but there is definitely story, told indirectly, and even something of a(n open) resolution. Recommended, as it’s otherwise not getting much attention in SFF circles, that I can see, and it's part of that conversation.**
* Best evidence: the prose-poem “Ten Responses to the Proposal to Overcome the Current Plague by Challenging It to a Duel.”
** The short list of works he found helpful, in the back, include Parable of the Sower and How Long ‘til Black Future Month?.
---L.
Subject quote from “The Light We Make,” from Not a Lot of Reasons to Sing, But Enough, Kyle Tran Myhre.
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Date: 2 February 2024 12:24 pm (UTC)oh hey, "Matches" lives rent-free in my head and this sounds amazing. thanks!
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Date: 2 February 2024 01:05 pm (UTC)“To Young Leaders” lives in mine.
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Date: 3 February 2024 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 3 February 2024 02:45 pm (UTC)Hope you like it (and can find it)!